Just Like Her
by Pixie Child
Summary: She turned out just like Faith (Slight FD, Dawn POV)


Slamming my feet into my thick-healed boots, I look at myself in the mirror and grin. Exactaly the look I was going for. Faith. Twirling around, my hair spins out and thanks to my crushed velvet blood-red tank I have on, my tattoo I told Buffy about can be seen on my right sholderblade. It's a dieing rose. Got it two weeks after Buff died, 'cause while I was mom's 'Little Punkin Bellie' she was her 'Beautiful Rose'.  
  
I creep into Buffy'r room, and climb out her window, ready for a night at the Bronze. At first, it was hard to climb down the tree in leather pants, but after a few years, it's gotten easier. I remember the Haloween when Faith was here, I dressed up as her and went to the Bronze for the first time. I didn't even need to show the bouncer my fake, he just asumed I was 18. How cool was that? But that best part was when Faith saw me and after asuring me that she wouldn't rat me out to Buff, she asked me waht I was. I told her I was a biker chick, and she grinned told me I looked like her. My pride flared.  
  
Now, at the Bronze, I know I must really look like her, because the looks the guys are giving me I've only ever seen when I was with her and the guys were checking out the brunette Slayer. I start dancing my way through the crowd, grinding up against various guys, not one of them really mattering to me. The only person I really want, I can't have. The only other crush I've ever had was on Xander, but that stopped one night when he, Anya, Willow and Tara were watching me while Buffy and Riley were shagging.  
  
"So, what'd you wanna do?" Willow asked brightly.  
  
"How 'bout we play 'Superhero'?" Xander suggested, and I nodded my head eagerly. I would have throwen myself off a bridge if he had been the one to give the get-go  
  
"H-h-how d-do you p-play?" Tara asked us.  
  
"Each person takes a turn saying what superhero they'd like to be like." I told Tara, and she nodded  
  
"Okay." We sat in a circle and Xander started.  
  
"Batman." He said, flatly. Willow giggled, and Tara looked like she was trying to stop herself from doing the same. If it had been anyone else who had said it, I would have roled my eyes, or burst into hysterical laughter. But on Xander it was, ugh, cute. "Okay, Ahn, your turn." He told her, and she grinned.  
  
"Halfreck." She said, and we all gave her blank looks. "Hally was my best friend for eleven hundred years. I used to tell her all about me vengance spells. She had demonic powers, and she only used them to avenge those who had been wronged, so that does clasify her as a superhero." Anya smiled, and this time I did role my eyes. She turned to look at me. "Your turn, Dawnie." She patted my head, and I wanted to slap her, wondering what the hell Xander saw in her.  
  
"You promise you won't tell?" I ask. If Buffy ever found out, she'd kill me. They all nodded, and Willow and Xander extanged knowing looks. Now that I look back, I realize they expected me to say Buffy.  
  
"Of corse, Dawnie. We're not spies for your sister." Willow told me.  
  
"Faith." Willow did a double-take, Xander broke into a coughing fit and Tara went white in shock. Anya just sat there, looking confused.  
  
"Wasn't Faith the phycotic Slayer who helped the mayor and Buffy had to put her in a coma?" She asked, and I think Willow mannaged to nod. "I didn't like her. She made fun of mine and Xander's sex life."  
  
"But I don't mean then." I protested. "I mean when she first came to Sunnydale." Xander, who had finally recovered, looked at me like I had just said the devil.  
  
"Dawnie..." Willow started carefully, like she were afraid I'd pull out Faith's 'insane hunting tool', as Buffy put it, and kill them all if she wasn't cautious with her words. "You don't want to be like Faith. She is evil. Sick, twisted and-"  
  
"She's a huge slut!" Xander burst out. I glaired at him, but he brushed it off. "Sorry, Dawn, but she is."  
  
The rest of that night, I sat quietly, haiting them all, most of all Xander.  
  
I never forgave him for that comment. Even as I dance with more men then I can count, I still feel a burning rage when I think of what he said about her. If they only knew that it's -their- Slayer that's the whore, and not mine, they'd probaly all suffer a breakdown. 'Cept Anya. She don't give a damn either way. Which I've gotta respect her for.  
  
First there was Angel. He was her 'One True Love' or some shit like that, so I kinda get it. SOrta the way I feel for Faith.  
  
Next, there was Xander, who she was screwing while she was daiting Angel, until he started going out with Cordelia.  
  
Then, when Angel went all Angelusly on us, Buffy started doing Devon, whom she was using as an escape until she ran away that summer after sending Angel to hell.  
  
When she came back, her and Cordelia were secreatly doing the nasty in the broom closets until Faith came to town.  
  
Faith, for some unknown reason, fell in love with my sister and would have done anything Buffy wanted.  
  
When my idol went bad, she met a sweet girl named Tara McClay who she used and discarded like a dirty tisue.  
  
When she met up with Parker, the only pissed was because -she- was the one who was supposed to be the user, not the other way around.  
  
By the time Riley came around, she had her act down pact. But as some godforsaken joke, she fell for him. But he left anyway, because he said she couldn't trust him, whatever -that- ment.  
  
And then there was Spike.  
  
Uh, huh. You. -Faith- is the slut, not good, 'ole Buffy. -Never- Buffy. She can't do anything wrong. It was -Spike- who had no right to do... whatever it was they did togeather.  
  
*I've done things with you I can't pronounce.*  
  
Nevermind that Buffy used him without a care about -his- feelings.  
  
And the Bitch just played it up.  
  
It's no wonder that I spend my nights drinking, dancing and and remembering my idol, and my mornings waking up in some stranger's bed, and sneaking back home before Buff sees that I'm not there.  
  
Not that she would even if I came home at noon.  
  
But as long as I don't do that, I won't know for sure, and I can keep living the little bubble I've formed and have lived in since mom died. The little bubble of denial I hide in when I'm sober, where my sister-mom actualy cares about me, my role modle is actualy fighting for redemption and not in jail just to avoide Buffy's wrath, Tara isn't the only one who loves me and gives a damn, and I don't dream of killing the rest ever night when I sleep.  
  
Lucky me, I did end up just like Faith. 


End file.
